Ativos dos museus

A questão da contabilidade dos museus é interessante. Como considerar um quadro como ativo? Em 'Heritage assets' scheme could see Stonehenge appearing on the books, Jennifer Hughes (Financial Times, 14/06/2008, London Ed2, p. 04) informa que UK Accounting Standards Board - que é responsável pelas normas contábeis na Inglaterra para o terceiro setor, propôs regras para evidenciação dos ativos e seu potencial valor:

Previous attempts to make museums account more clearly for their holdings have met with fierce opposition and this week's proposal is, in fact, a rare second draft after parts of its predecessor drew criticism.

The ASB's argument centres around the fact that heritage assets, be they ancient artefacts or vintage cars, are just that - assets - which have an economic value to the institution that holds them and should therefore appear in the books, at least in the footnotes.

But museums and galleries claim that producing values for each of their holdings is a time-consuming and costly process and of little benefit to anyone.

The National Gallery, for example, last year reported balance sheet assets of just £318m, of which heritage assets made up £65m, courtesy of a change to the rules in 2001 that forced institutions to report acquisitions and disposals after that date.

Its footnotes, however, made clear its disapproval. "The collection . . . is inalienable, unique, irreplaceable, ancient, fragile and very valuable. It is truly 'priceless' in that it cannot be valued meaningfully," it added.

Accountants are divided on the issue. Most appreciate the theoretical value of putting assets clearly on the books but concede the practical difficulties in these cases.

"Does Stonehenge have a value? I bet Disney would buy it. But would that value really mean anything? Probably not," said Ken Wild, national director of accounting at Deloitte.

"There are those who say there's no point putting some things in when so much will still be off the books, but is it then right that none of it appears when it clearly has some economic value."

Museums have made much of the fact that it is hard to find a proper value and even where there are markets, such as for paintings, prices are still subjective.

"I'm not sure a numerical value really adds much unless you were planning to sell," said Steve Taylor, a valuation specialist at Ernst & Young.

"You could end up trying to use cash flow from gate receipts, or some other measure for something like the Rosetta Stone [a tablet that unlocked the meaning of Egyptian hieroglyphics]. But what if there was a terrorist attack on London and there were less tourists? Would reported values then fall?"